Section 1

CO

OCT 2 3 1376"

The Island of Doctor Moreau

The

Island of Doctor Moreau

A Possibility

By
H. G. Wells

New York
Stone esT Kimball

MDCCCXCVI

COPYRIGHT

BY STONE AND KIMBALL
MDCCCXCVI

Contents

INTRODUCTION vii
I IN THE DINGEY OF THE "LADY

VAIN" 9
II THE MAN WHO WAS GOING

NOWHERE 15

III THE STRANGE FACE ai

IV AT THE SCHOONER'S RAIL 31
V THE MAN WHO HAD NOWHERE

TO GO 37

VI THE EVIL-LOOKING BOATMEN 45

VII THE LOCKED DOOR 54

VIII THE CRYING OF THE PUMA 63

IX THE THING IN THE FOREST 69

X THE CRYING OF THE MAN 86

XI THE HUNTING OF THE MAN 93

XII THE SAYERS OF THE LAW 103

XIII THE PARLEY 118

XIV DOCTOR MOREAU EXPLAINS 127
XV CONCERNING THE BEAST FOLK 147

XVI How THE BEAST FOLK TASTE

BLOOD 157

XVII A CATASTROPHE 180

XVIII THE FINDING OF MOREAU 189

XIX MONTGOMERY'S BANK HOLIDAY 197

XX ALONE WITH THE BEAST FOLK 211

XXI THE REVERSION OF THE BEAST

FOLK 221

XXII THE MAN ALONE 243

INTRODUCTION.

February the First, 1887, the ^aify
Vain was lost by collision with a
derelict when about the latitude i° S. and
longitude 107° W.

On January the Fifth, 1888 — that is
eleven months and four days after — my
uncle, Edward Prendick, a private gentle-
man, who certainly went aboard the Lady
Vain at Callao, and who had been con-
sidered drowned, was picked up in latitude
5° 3' S. and longitude 101° W. in a small
open boat of which the name was illegible,
but which is supposed to have belonged to
the missing schooner Ipecacuanha. He
gave such a strange account of himself
that he was supposed demented. Subse-
quently he alleged that his mind was a
blank from the moment of his escape from
the Lady Vain. His case was discussed
among psychologists at the time as a
curious instance of the lapse of memory
v

Introduction

consequent upon physical and mental stress.
The following narrative was found among
his papers by the undersigned, his nephew
and heir, but unaccompanied by any definite
request for publication.

The only island known to exist in the
region in which my uncle was picked up is
Noble's Isle, a small volcanic islet and
uninhabited. It was visited in 1891 by
H. M. S. Scorpion. A party of sailors then
landed, but found nothing living thereon
except certain curious white moths, some
hogs and rabbits, and some rather peculiar
rats. So that this narrative is without con-
firmation in its most essential particular.
With that understood, there seems no harm
in putting this strange story before the
public in accordance, as I believe, with
my uncle's intentions. There is at least
this much in its behalf: my uncle passed
out of human knowledge about latitude 5°
S. and longitude 105° E., and reappeared
in the same part of the ocean after a space
of eleven months. In some way he must
have lived during the interval. And it
seems that a schooner called the Ipecacuanha
with a drunken captain, John Davies, did
vi

Introduction

start from Africa with a puma and certain
other animals aboard in January, 1887, that
the vessel was well known at several ports
in the South Pacific, and that it finally dis-
appeared from those seas (with a consider-
able amount of copra aboard), sailing to its
unknown fate from Bayna in December,
1887, a date that tallies entirely with my
uncle's story.

CHARLES EDWARD PRENDICK.

VII

The Island of Doctor Moreau.

(The Story written by Edward Prendick.)

I.

IN THE DINGEY OF THE

T DO not propose to add anything to what has
* already been written concerning the loss of
the "Lady Vain." As every one knows, she
collided with a derelict when ten days out from
Callao. The long-boat, with seven of the
crew, was picked up eighteen days after by
H. M. gunboat "Myrtle," and the story of
their terrible privations has become quite as
well known as the far more horrible "Medusa "
case. But I have to add to the published story
of the "Lady Vain" another, possibly as hor-
rible and far stranger. It has hitherto been
supposed that the four men who were in the
dingey perished, but this is incorrect. I have

9

The Island of Doctor Moreau.

the best of evidence for this assertion : I was
one of the four men.

But in the first place I must state that there
never were four men in the dingey, — the
number was three. Constans, who was " seen
by the captain to jump into the gig," * luckily
for us and unluckily for himself did not reach
us. He came down out of the tangle of ropes
under the stays of the smashed bowsprit, some
small rope caught his heel as he let go, and he
hung for a moment head downward, and then
fell and struck a block or spar floating in the
water. We pulled towards him, but he never
came up.

I say luckily for us he did not reach us, and
I might almost say luckily for himself; for we
had only a small breaker of water and some
soddenrecfc ship's biscuits with us, so sudden had
been the alarm, so unprepared the ship for any
disaster. We thought the people on the launch
would be better provisioned (though it seems
they were not), and we tried to hail them.
They could not have heard us, and the next
morning when the drizzle cleared, — which
1 Daily News, March 17, 1887.
IO

In the Dingey of the " Lady Vain."

was not until past midday, — we could see
nothing of them. We could not stand up to
look about us, because of the pitching of the
boat. The two other men who had escaped
so far with me were a man named Helmar, a
passenger like myself, and a seaman whose
name I don't know, — a short sturdy man,
with a stammer.

We drifted famishing, and, after our water
had come to an end, tormented by an intoler-
able thirst, for eight days altogether. After the
second day the sea subsided slowly to a glassy
calm. It is quite impossible for the ordinary
reader to imagine those eight days. He has
not, luckily for himself, anything in his memory
to imagine with. After the first day we said
little to one another, and lay in our places in
the boat and stared at the horizon, or watched,
with eyes that grew larger and more haggard
every day, the misery and weakness gaining
upon our companions. The sun became piti-
less. The water ended on the fourth day, and
we were already thinking strange things and
saying them with our eyes ; but it was, I think,
the sixth before Helmar gave voice to the thing
ii

The Island of Doctor Moreau.

we had all been thinking. I remember our
voices were dry and thin, so that we bent
towards one another and spared our words. I
stood out against it with all my might, was
rather for scuttling the boat and perishing to-
gether among the sharks that followed us ; but
when Helmar said that if his proposal was
accepted we should have drink, the sailor came
round to him.

I would not draw lots however^ and in the
night the sailor whispered to Helmar again and
again, and I sat in the bows with my clasp-
knife in my hand, though I doubt if I had the
stuff in me to fight ; and in the morning I agreed
to Helmar' s proposal, and we handed halfpence
to find the odd man. The lot fell upon the
sailor ; but he was the strongest of us and would
not abide by it, and attacked Helmar with his
hands. They grappled together and almost
stood up. I crawled along the boat to them,
intending to help Helmar by grasping the sailor's
leg ; but the sailor stumbled with the swaying
of the boat, and the two fell upon the gunwale
and rolled overboard together. They sank
like stones. I remember laughing at that, and

12

In the Dingey of the " Lady Vain."

wondering why I laughed. The laugh caught
me suddenly like a thing from without.

I lay across one of the thwarts for I know
not how long, thinking that if I had the strength
I would drink sea-water and madden myself to
die quickly. And even as I lay there I saw,
with no more interest than if it had been a pic-
ture, a sail come up towards me over the sky-
line. My mind must have been wandering,
and yet I remember all that happened, quite
distinctly. I remember how my head swayed
with the seas, and the horizon with the sail
above it danced up and down ; but I also re-
member as distinctly that I had a persuasion
that I was dead, and that I thought what a jest
it was that they should come too late by such a
little to catch me in my body.

For an endless period, as it seemed to me, I
lay with my head on the thwart watching the
schooner (she was a little ship, schooner-
rigged fore and aft) come up out of the sea.
She kept tacking to and fro in a widening com-
pass, for she was sailing dead into the wind.
It never entered my head to attempt to attract
attention, and I do not remember anything dis-

'3

The Island of Doctor Moreau.

tinctly after the sight of her side until I found
myself in a little cabin aft. There 's a dim
half-memory of being lifted up to the gangway,
and of a big red countenance covered with
freckles and surrounded with red hair staring at
me over the bulwarks. I also had a discon-
nected impression of a dark face, with extraor-
dinary eyes, close to mine; but that I thought
was a nightmare, until I met it again. I fancy
I recollect some stuff being poured in between
my teeth ; and that is all.

II.

THE MAN WHO WAS GOING NOWHERE.

HTHE cabin in which I found myself was
*• small and rather untidy. A youngish
man with flaxen hair, a bristly straw-coloured
moustache, and a dropping nether lip, was sit-
ting and holding my wrist. For a minute we
stared at each other without speaking. He had
watery grey eyes, oddly void of expression.
Then just overhead came a sound like an iron
bedstead being knocked about, and the low
angry growling of some large animal. At the
same time the man spoke. He repeated his
question, —

" How do you feel now ? "

I think I said I felt all right. I could not
recollect how I had got there. He must have
seen the question in my face, for my voice was
inaccessible to me.

" You were picked up in a boat, starving.
The name on the boat was the ' Lady Vain,'
and there were spots of blood on the gunwale."

The Island of Doctor Moreau.

At the same time my eye caught my hand,
thin so that it looked like a dirty skin-purse full
of loose bones, and all the business of the boat
came back to me.

" Have some of this," said he, and gave me
a dose of some scarlet stuff, iced.

It tasted like blood, and made me feel stronger.

"You were in luck," said he, "to get
picked up by a ship with a medical man aboard."
He spoke with a slobbering articulation, with
the ghost of a lisp.

" What ship is this?" I said slowly, hoarse
from my long silence.

"It's a little trader from Arica and Callao.
I never asked where she came from in the begin-
ning, — out of the land of born fools, I guess.
I'm a passenger myself, from Arica. The
silly ass who owns her, — he's captain too,
named Davies, — he 's lost his certificate, or
something. You know the kind of man, —
calls the thing the ' Ipecacuanha,' of all silly,
infernal names; though when there's much
of a sea without any wind, she certainly acts
according."

(Then the noise overhead began again, a
16

The Man who was going Nowhere.

snarling growl and the voice of a human being
together. Then another voice, telling some
" Heaven-forsaken idiot ' ' to desist. )

" You were nearly dead," said my inter-
locutor. '.' It was a very near thing, indeed.
But I *ve put some stuff into you now. Notice
your arm 's sore ? Injections. You 've been
insensible for nearly thirty hours."

I thought slowly. (I was distracted now by
the yelping of a number of dogs.) " Am I
eligible for solid food ? " I asked.

" Thanks to me," he said. " Even now
the mutton is boiling."

" Yes," I said with assurance ; " I could eat
some mutton."

"But," said he with a momentary hesitation,
" you know I 'm dying to hear of how you
came to be alone in that boat. Damn that
howling / " I thought I detected a certain sus-
picion in his eyes.

He suddenly left the cabin, and I heard him in
violent controversy with some one, who seemed
to me to talk gibberish in response to him.
The matter sounded as though it ended in blows,
but in that I thought my ears were mistaken.

2 I7

The Island of Doctor Moreau.

Then he shouted at the dogs, and returned
the cabin.

"Well?" said he in the doorway. " Yc
were just beginning to tell me."

I told him my name, Edward Prendick, and
how I had taken to Natural History as a relief
from the dulness of my comfortable indepen-
dence.

He seemed interested in this. "I 've done
some science myself. I did my Biology at
University College, — getting out the ovary of
the earthworm and the radula of the snail, and
all that. Lord ! It 's ten years ago. But go
on ! go on! tell me about the boat."

He was evidently satisfied with the frankness
of my story, which I told in concise sentences
enough, for I felt horribly weak ; and when it
was finished he reverted at once to the topic of
Natural History and his own biological studies.
He began to question me closely about Totten-
ham Court Road and Gower Street. " Is Cap-
latzi still flourishing ? What a shop that was ! ' '
He had evidently been a very ordinary medical
student, and drifted incontinently to the topic
of the music halls. He told me some anecdotes.
• 18

The Man who was going Nowhere.

"Left it all,*' he said, " ten years ago. How
jolly it all used to be ! But I made a young
ass of myself, — played myself out before I was
twenty-one. I daresay it's all different now.
But I must look up that ass of a cook, and see
what he 's done to your mutton."

The growling overhead was renewed, so sud-
denly and with so much savage anger that it
startled me. "What's that?" I called after
him, but the door had closed. He came back
again with the boiled mutton, and I was so
excited by the appetising smell of it that I forgot
the noise of the beast that had troubled me.

After a day of alternate sleep and feeding I
was so far recovered as to be able to get from
my bunk to the scuttle, and see the green seas
trying to keep pace with us. I judged the
schooner was running before the wind. Mont-
gomery — that was the name of the flaxen-haired
man — came in again as I stood there, and I
asked him for some clothes. He lent me some
duck things of his own, for those I had worn in
the boat had been thrown overboard. They
were rather loose for me, for he was large and
long in his limbs. He told me casually that

The Island of Doctor Moreau.

the captain was three-parts drunk in his own
cabin. As I assumed the clothes, I began ask-
ing him some questions about the destination of
the ship. He said the ship was bound to
Hawaii, but that it had to land him first.

"Where?" said I.

"It's an island, where I live. So far as I
know, it hasn't got a name."

He stared at me with his nether lip dropping,
and looked so wilfully stupid of a sudden that
it came into my head that he desired to avoid
my questions. I had the discretion to ask no
more.

III.

THE STRANGE FACE.

VX7E left the cabin and found a man at the
companion obstructing our way. He was
standing on the ladder with his back to us, peer-
ing over the combing of the hatchway. He
was, I could see, a misshapen man, short, broad,
and clumsy, with a crooked back, a hairy neck,
and a head sunk between his shoulders. He
was dressed in dark-blue serge, and had pecu-
liarly thick, coarse, black hair. I heard the
unseen dogs growl furiously, and forthwith he
ducked back, — coming into contact with the
hand I put out to fend him off from myself.
He 'turned with animal swiftness.

In some indefinable way the black face thus
flashed upon me shocked me profoundly. It
was a singularly deformed one. The facial
part projected, forming something dimly sug-
gestive of a muzzle, and the huge half-open
mouth showed as big white teeth as I had ever

21

The Island of Doctor Moreau.

seen in a human mouth. His eyes were blood-
shot at the edges, with scarcely a rim of white
round the hazel pupils. There was a curious
glow of excitement in his face.